Christmas Eve Lunch at Wooloomooloo Prime, The One, Tsim Sha Tsui, Hong Kong

Wooloomooloo Prime boasts impressive floor-to-ceiling multi million dollar view of the fragrant harbour.

I bet the view would be even more impressive at night.

The decor is modern and chic...let's see if the food is good.


We ordered their Christmas Set Lunch menu, priced at HK$288 per person plus service charge (not including drinks).

The meal started with herb and tomato bread, which was served warm. It's crusty on the outside, perfectly fluffy and soft on the inside. Love it.


I was absolutely happy with the Asparagus, pancetta and poached egg salad with Bearnaise sauce. If you thought nothing is sexier than seeing yolk running out of a perfectly poached egg, try seeing it oozing onto a pile of bacon. Yum!


The shellfish salad featuring yabby, mussels, shrimp, greens and heart of palms in mustard dressing was...alright. But I guess it's a bit unfair of me, a meat and egg yolk lover, to compare this to the sexiness of the poached egg salad ^_*


The raspberry mint iced tea was refreshing, excellent for the surprisingly hot winter day.


I am a sucker for lychee drinks, so I ordered their cool mint mocktail, which had canned lychee chunks, lychee juice, soda water, ginger ale and fresh mint. Again, refreshing.


Love the cream of wild mushrooms soup, which was served with truffle oil and garlic croutons. Super tasty! Plus, call me crazy, but I adore the rich golden tinge of this mushroom soup, it's not the normal grey concoction we usually get.


The Australian lamb fillet was super delicious. Everything on the plate was perfectly cooked.


Ultra tender meat, flavorful ratatouille, tasty red wine sauce. Lovely!


We were a bit disappointed by the grilled Australian rib eye steak.


This corner of the steak seemed nicely cooked (we ordered medium), but the rest of the steak was sadly overcooked. The roasted potatoes and vegetables cpuld use a lot more seasoning and the peppercorn sauce on the steak did nothing to save the overcooked meat.


The traditional Christmas pudding with Brandy, Cinnamon and Raisin Ice cream was delightful. Wonderfully chewy, sticky and sweet spiced pudding, absolutely perfect with the ice cream.


The mango custard cheesecake with red fruit compote and tuille was equally lovely. Rich and creamy goodness on a plate.

Although we did appreciate our window seat overlooking the beautiful view of Hong Kong harbour, the heat (even in winter!) was so unbearable, we were drenched in sweat even after peeling our layers of clothing. So unsexy, it's not even funny! We did voice our concern to the manager, who joked that he should start selling sunglasses and tanning oil (I suggested truffle oil?) and he cranked up the air con immediately. We (and our sweaty asses) truly appreciated his prompt action.

Oh...and beautiful view?

SC said, what view?

Wooloomooloo Prime
21/F, The ONE
100 Nathan Road
Tsim Sha Tsui
Tel: +852 2870 0087

Happy Holidays!

What are we going to eat this Christmas?
KFC?
McDonald's?
Something fancy?
Ahem...let's see ^_*

Happy holidays, everybody!
May your feasts be oh-so-delicious!

Pizza Hut's Hong Kong - Meat Lover's Cheesy Volcano Pizza

Testing, testing...
1,2,3...

Your eyes aren't wrong.
You aren't having a nightmare (or are you?)
This is really a pizza from... (gasp!) Pizza Hut.

I tried Pizza Hut for the first time back when I was in Indonesia. I was in high school. Yes, we're that slow. I haven't tried McDonald's until I was 18 and I tried (cooked) sushi for the first time when I was 23. I was so fascinated by the sushi train, it was ridiculous.

Eating at Pizza Hut was such a luxury for me. I remember loving creamy beef fettucini so much, licking the baking dish it was served in clean. Gleaming clean, I also remember the garlic bread...and...the meat lover's pizza, thick crust. Ahhh...nostalgia.

I have a confession to make.
I like Pizza Hut's meat lover's pizza.
Why? Why? Why?
Maybe it's the high-in-sodium-ness, maybe it's all the processed "meat" on top of its mass produced "crust", maybe it's all the "cheese" topping of stuffing, or maybe it's the sugary, chemically engineered "tomato sauce".

I dunno.
It doesn't mean that I hate good pizza...handmade, fresh ingredients, rustic or avant garde ones...I love them too. But deep down, there's always a place for this little junk in my heart trunk.

I am not trying to justify myself.
Just saying ;)

Will you stop reading my blog after you've seen this post?
Heheheh.
I hope not.

Curry Chicken & Frozen Roti Pratha "Pot Pie"

Look at this...

...is it one of those tasty soup with buttery flaky puff pastry?
Is it a pot pie?
I'd think so too, but this isn't.

The flaky buttery top is made of frozen roti pratha and under it...curry chicken!
If you want to make something that looks impressively pretty, tastes absolutely delicious and extremely easy to make. This one's for you.

Recipe
- 1 frozen roti pratha (per serving/per pot) and a bit of butter
- 2 chicken leg fillet, remove skin, cut into bite size chunks
- 2 clove garlic, crushed
- 1 cm ginger, crushed
- 2 shallot, thinly sliced
- 1 lemongrass, sliced into 5cm long pieces
- a few kaffir lime leaves
- a cup coconut milk
- flour (optional), hot water, cooking oil, salt, pepper, sugar, ground corriander, cumin
or you can skip all of these spices and just cook the chicken chunks with your favorite curry paste, red, green, or yellow, and coconut milk.

Preheat oven to 200C. Saute aromatics in some hot oil, add chicken chunks until they're a bit browned, add spices and seasoning, add coconut milk, thicken with some flour to give your "pie filling" some volume if you wish, or skip it and let coconut milk do all the thickening. Pour curry chicken into an oven proof pot, place frozen roti pratha on top, brush with butter, bake until roti pratha is golden brown.

Grab a spoon, push the buttery and flaky frozen pratha into your thick and rich curry for maximum enjoyment.
Licking lips optional.
:)

Sambal Goreng Tahu Tempe - Tofu & Soy Bean Cake in Chilli Paste

Another "keeping it real" post.
No food styling, no pretty utensils, no pretty food pictures.
This is how dinners are consumed in the haus of Mochachocolata-Rita.
Additionally, since the arrival of baby Marcus, dinner duration has been reduced from 15 minutes (!) to generally under 5 minutes (!!!)

(We know, we know...eating too fast is unhealthy T_T)

But don't underestimate this ugliness.
This is what I always call ugly delicious.
Extremely tasty and addictive. Those who avoid carb should kiss this dish goodbye, as it would be hard to limit ourselves to eat less rice. I ate triple portion of rice because of this dish!
Although this dish is vegetarian, you'll get enough protein from the tofu puffs and tempe.
Totally satisfying.
Burp~

Recipe
- 1 block of tempe, cut into chunks (1x1x3cm)
- 10 tofu puffs, halved (or 1 block of firm tofu cut into cubes)
- oil, salt and pepper
Simple chilli paste
- 1 tomato (optional)
- a handful of chillies (remove seeds and choose less hotter varieties if you don't want it too spicy)
- 2 garlic
- 4 shallot
- oil, salt, pepper, sugar, ground corriander

Lightly season and pan fry tempe cubes until they're a bit browned, set aside (you can totally skip this step to minimize the use of oil). Throw all the chilli paste ingredients into a food processor and pulse until everything's mixed well but it doesn't need to be fine and smooth. Heat up a bit of oil, add paste, add tofu and tempe chunks, season with salt, pepper, sugar and ground corriander, mix well, serve with lotssss of rice.

Burp~
...and reaching out for another bowl of rice yet again.
Excuse me.

Casa Fina Seafood & Oyster Bar, Causeway Bay, Hong Kong

Last night a couple of friends treated me to a nice dinner at Casa Fina. It's my super early birthday dinner. It's funny how I "moved" from celebrating my birthday from the Indonesian way (my treat, better to celebrate later than earlier) to the Hong Kong way (others' treat, better to celebrate earlier than later).

Here are the deliciousness we had to cheer me up.
After all, birthday means that I'm another year older and (in my case) many many pounds heavier.
Heheheh.

Buy-one-get-one-free oysters, Namibia, Scottish Rock and French oysters. I especially love the French ones. Sweet, crunchy and fresh...the flavors transported me to a beautiful place by the sea....blablabla...gosh, stop it. This is not my style.

They're yummy.
OK. That sounds more like me.
Heheheh.

As an appetizer, we ordered the calamari.

Perfectly cooked, tender calamari rings, the breading isn't the crispy type, but it's flavorful. The parmesan bits...what's not to love?...and we especially love the horseradish creamy dip. It made everything perfect.


The black truffle and wild cream of mushroom soup was delightful, tasty, creamy, and there are a couple slices of black truffle in it.


The lobster bisque didn't impress us. It's underseasoned and overly bitter. The soup was served with a side of nicely toasted, buttery bread.


The duck liver and wild mushroom linguini was as fantastic as it sounds. Rich and earthy flavors with perfectly cooked pasta. Sold!


The lamb could be a little more charred and it's a tiny bit undercooked. Other than that, it's decent and the portion is generous.


The warm chocolate cake is nothing earth shattering, but it's more than adequate. Very chocolatey cake with warm chocolate liquid oozing out of the cake once you've digged into it. Too bad I didn't get the money shot ^_^'


We were very impressed by the pumpkin ice cream. Very light, not too sweet, the pumpkin flavor was there...and it's served in a cute tiny pumpkin! How adorable! I wish the pumpkin wasn't as frozen so that we could dig into it and...consume it.

I'll totally go back to try their sea urchin spaghetti and pomelo sherbet.

The meal costs us just below HK$450 each with three glasses of wine.

Casa Fina Seafood & Oyster Bar
13/F, Henry House, 40-42 Yun Ping Road
Causeway Bay, Hong Kong
Tel: +852 2504 2928

Instant Coffee & Chocolate Chip Cake

Remember my previous miserable failure?
This time, it's so much better.
Moist, soft, fluffy, the coffee flavor is there, with bites of coffee bits and dark chocolate chips, and as always, super easy to make.

Perfect for the always-sleepy workday afternoons.
If you're not an instant coffee kinda person, replace the instant coffee bit with your favorite.

Recipe
Dry ingredients
- 1 cup all purpose flour
- 1/3 cup + 1 tbsp caster sugar
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 2 tsp instant coffee
Wet ingredients
- 1 sachet instant coffee (I used Old Town Hazelnut 3-1 Instant coffee. It does have a bit of sugar, if you are not using already sweetened coffee mix, add 1 more tbsp sugar), dissolve in a bit of hot water, top up with cool water to make 2/3 cup
- 1 egg, beaten
- 1/4 cup vegetable oil
- a dash of vanilla essence
- I dunno if I was mad, but I added a dash of Korean soju in the mix just because I saw it sitting around in my fridge when I was picking up an egg, you can totally omit this
- about 10 small dark chocolate chips per cake (I use Hershey's)

Preheat oven to 180C, mix dry ingredients in a mixing bowl. Mix wet ingredients in another bowl. Make a well in the mixture of dry ingredients, pour in the wet ingredients and mix. Pour into muffin mold lined with cupcake liners until about 3/4 full. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean.

Wake up and smell the coffee!
Happy Monday!

La Maison du Chocolat Christmas 2010 Creation - Chocolate Raspberry Bûche

Another Friday indulgence for me, Chocolate Raspberry Bûche, La Maison du Chocolate's Christmas 2010 creation. What can I say? It's every bit as fantastic as it looks! A perfect balance of textures and flavors. Soft, smooth, crunchy, chewy, sweet, rich, chocolatey, sharp, with an explosion of runny tangy raspberry in the middle. Wonderful!

As it's super hard for me to get just one...we also ordered the Chestnut cake.

The combination of textures and chestnut flavor is there...but in comparison to the chocolate raspberry bûche, this is a lot more...subtle.

TGIF!

La Maison du Chocolat
Prince's Building - Shop 109
First Floor, 10 Charter Road, Central
Hong Kong
Tel : (+852) 2801 4122

http://www.lamaisonduchocolat.com/

Ayam Cah Mete - Chicken & Cashew Nuts Stir Fry

This dish appears in most Chinese menu in Indonesia, but I hardly (if not never) see it in Hong Kong. I love the hearty chicken chunks with the crunch and nuttiness (duh!) of the cashew nuts. Cauliflower is quite a common addition to this dish, but I decided to add large green chillies for an extra kick of heat, and refreshing tang.

Recipe
- 2 boneless thigh chicken fillet, remove skin and cut into bite sized pieces
- 1/2 onion, thinly sliced
- 1 garlic, crushed
- 1/2 cm ginger, crushed
- 1 large green chilli, remove seeds, cut into chunks
- a handful of roasted cashew nuts
- vegetable oil, corn flour, water, light soy sauce, sugar, white pepper

Mix chicken chunks with corn starch, light soy sauce, sugar and white pepper. Saute garlic, ginger, onion and green chilli in hot vegetable oil until fragrant, add chicken chunks, add cashew nuts, adjust seasoning if necessary, add water if you want more "sauce", add corn starch diluted in water if you want the "sauce" to be thicker. Serve with steamed rice.

If you see a "foggy" photograph again such as this one, it's probably because I couldn't find a decent photo to post.
Opppps. Sorry ^_^'

Indonesian Tofu Pancake - Bakwan Tahu

Ohhh...I love having a helper!
My helper loves eating deep fried food and she doesn't mind doing all the deep frying. Oh yeah!
Hello, delicious crispy treats! She made this yesterday and she shared the recipe with me.

Recipe
- 1 pack of soft tofu, crushed
- flour
- corn flour
- 1 small clove of garlic, finely minced
- 1 shallot, finely minced
- salt, pepper, ground corriander, water, oil for frying
- 1 egg, beaten
- 1 stalk of spring onion, chopped

Mix all ingredients to form a thin batter, add flour if it's too thin, add a bit of water if too thick. The batter should not be too thick (as in porridge), it should be thin, almost runny. Heat up some oil in frying pan, ladle batter and pan fry until golden brown, pressing it down to make it flat and crispy. Serve immediately. Ideally with some Indonesian Sambal ABC or your favorite hot sauce.

You'll also be seeing me snacking on Strepsils or Dequadin too as things could get pretty heaty ^_^'

PS. Do you like the "old" photo effect on this post?

Oh What A Night! Sugar & Feast - East Hotel, Hong Kong

I've heard so so so much about Sugar, and finally, last week, I've had the chance to try it, many thanks to East for the invitation.


As I entered the place, I saw a super stylish place, filled by young, hip and chic crowd chilling out...

...sipping drinks, sampling snacks, and chit-chatting, generally having the much needed good time after work. Walking by, I was still trying to maintain my composure, pretending to be cool, but when I saw where I was about to sit...

Wow.

(photo courtesy of East, effectively ruined by me ^_*)
WOW indeed! What a view and what a cool corner! And what's cooler than that? I've met wonderful people, Patricia of Plain Face Angel, Takako who writes for Cathay Pacific Travel Blog, Frances and Selina from East, and the ever so hungry Jason of Life as A Bon Vivant.


I started the night with Sugar's Espresso-tini. I am not much of a drinker, but I am a sucker for cocktails, and I love this one. It's sweet yet light, not too creamy, the coffee flavor is there, with a fragrant hint of cinnamon. Cheers!

Oh, one embarrassing moment. The bean bags where we sat on were hip, stylish and everything, but I sank so deep, I had a hard time getting up and spilled quite a bit of my Espresso-tini on the table. Opps. Maybe I'm too...ehm...fat wholesome for the bean bags? So much for trying to look "composed" ^_^'

When this platter of goodies arrived, I've totally forgotten about pretending to look cool. I went mad!

It's a sausage tree! My favorite's the big-fat-tender-juicy-and-tasty ones at the bottom. Absolutely delicious! My favorite item from the snack platter is the spicy feta cheese spring rolls. I love that extra kick of spiciness. There was also a yummy cheese platter and endless servings of crispy papadum to down my drink with.

Fantastic view, tasty snacks, delicious drinks...it's a great place for the young (or the young at heart, like me?) and hip to hang out after work or bring a date for before-or-after-dinner-drinks. Simply perfect for the don't-wanna-go-home population of Hong Kong ^_^

I had a little too much fun, I almost forgot to make some room for dinner at Feast.

Please allow me to make a girly comment: love the orange butterflies on the wall. How pretty!

We were seated at the chef's table, a gorgeous corner overlooking the "open kitchen".

Nothing I love more than seeing chefs at work, getting a glimpse the actions that made deliciousness happen.


The meal started with a bread basket, and a savory girl that I am, I love the crispy cheese bread.


We sampled some oysters from the buffet spread, which were fresh and creamy.


We also had different kinds of ham, slices of melon and pickled shallots. Very refreshing. The melon brought out the best of the white wine we had.

Every dish was served with a carefully selected wine.

I may not know much about wine, but if the wine makes the food taste better or vice versa, it's all good in my book ^_*

On to the next course...

I adore the idea of the Goats Curd and Mushroom Tartlet with Pancetta Crumble and Yellow Pepper Jam since I am a big fan of savory pastries. The yellow pepper jam was a highlight of the dish, it gives the much needed touch of sweetness to balance the rest of the savory ingredients.

The next course is my favorite of the night.

The name "Lobster" Tea, Foam, Grilled, and Ice Cream aroused our curiosity. Lobster? Ice cream? Really? Yes, and it was fantastic! We're supposed to start with the subtly flavored lobster tea, which was light and refreshing. The lobster foam was light in texture, but bursting with flavors of a good lobster bisque. If I didn't think about my company, I would've licked the bowl clean! The grilled lobster was succulent and perfectly cooked, and the lobster ice cream? Satiny smooth, rich and creamy goodness!


The dish was served with a glass of rose. Call me shallow, but apart from the flavors, scent, and how it complement the dishes, I also love how pretty the pink is. Please excuse me for being such a girl.


We had a rockmelon lime sherbet. I am a huge fan of melon. But I never thought of pairing citrus with melon. I always thought of melon as a "sweet" fruit and adding citrus would ruin it. Clearly, I was wrong. The addition of citrus made this combination perfect as a palate cleanser. I was ready for our next course.

When this came...

...I thought we were getting a rich and moist chocolate cake! Obviously, I was wrong. Heheheh. Call me crazy, but I love being deceived by appearances. I love playful. I love whimsical.

What was it?

It's Vanilla Braised Beef Cheek with Celeriac Ravioli and Leek Consomme. The beef was impossibly tender! It's a result of hours and hours of braising. I had always been skeptical on the trend of cooking savory dishes with vanilla. However, the touch vanilla of vanilla in this dish is subtle, just the right amount to enhance the dish without being overwhelming.


The robust flavored dish was served with this bottle red wine. Guess what we discussed the most? It's not how the wine has fruity after taste, etc, but how much we all love the packaging of the wine. Heheheh. Packaging is important!

Ready for something sweet? The chef insisted that we start with this...

...and finish it in one shot!
Aptly named Snap Crakle and Fruit Pop, it "exploded" in our mouth in a plethora of fruitiness. How playful! How creative!

The meal ended with a plate of petit fours and Moscato dessert wine, which was so good, I totally forgot to take a picture of it ^_^'

More than a night of delectable treats in a fabulous place, it's a night of great conversations, plenty of laughs, with amazing people. Thanks for hosting such a wonderful event, East!

Hong Kongers, have you made plans for the holidays? East might just be it ;)

Sugar
32/F East
29 Taikoo Shing Road, Island East
Hong Kong
Tel: +852 3968 3738


Feast
1/F East

29 Taikoo Shing Road, Island East

Hong Kong

Tel: +852 3968 37777
Website: http://www.east-hongkong.com